Snowed under with work and not got round to sending out your Christmas cards yet? Don’t panic, you can still redeem yourself with an environmentally-friendly video card instead.
Last year all the rage was Flash-animated cards that were embedded in emails. Getting an original virtual card devised by a developer was expensive and often didn’t compare favourably with the expense of getting customised cards printed and posted. The alternative was getting your hands on a free animated card that didn’t look particularly personalised.
Now, however, the animated virtual cards have moved over to make way for the video card. And here’s how to beat the Christmas postal rush, save money, be environmentally-friendly and have the kudos of having expended some time and thought on your Yuletide message to customers, suppliers and trading partners.
At this stage in the game, there’s no time left to start learning how to make a digital video, so we’ll just skip that completely and get on with making our Christmas video card.
Setting up
Check the backdrop and try to inject some festive spirit without it being too overpowering. You don’t want to appear to have a Christmas tree growing out your ear, for instance. Get in close, this is a cosy wee chat to camera. Have an assistant check that you are in focus.
The shot to aim for is something festive and informal, like you’re sitting talking directly to the recipient of your card. Try to fill most of the screen with you rather than desk or your virtual Chrimbo card will start to take on the appearance of the Queen’s speech.
Scripting
This is down to your personal preference. A script will more than likely remove umms and aahs, but can come across as stilted and staged unless you are able to deliver it in a natural speaking voice. If happier speaking off the top of your head, go for it.
Of course, if neither of these ideas appeal, when not try a little festive song, joke or story instead? It’s your card so feel free to do with it what you will. Bear in mind that whatever creative brainwave you record, it shouldn’t be too rambly or too short. Fifteen to twenty seconds is probably about the right length. And watch out you don’t infringe copyright.
Edit
Since few of us are TV presenters, expect to do a few takes to get it right. Aim to do your piece to camera in one continuous stream; it will look more natural and sincere, and less ‘set up’ than a video that betrays the editing process due to jerkiness between frames. With time being of the essence, fancy cutaways and transitions should be sidelined in favour of keeping it simple. Forget opening titles and simply launch straight into your festive message, you can always end the video by fading to black and displaying a simple greeting message in text.
Publishing
There are a couple of options here. Option A is to upload the video to a video sharing site like Youtube.com. Most allow users to upload videos, opt to make them private and send out invitations to view it by email.
Option B is to create a page within your own site and embed the video into it.
One of the easiest ways to stream video within a web page browser is this code supplied by nuweb.co.uk
<center><center><OBJECT id='mediaPlayer' width="320" height="240"
classid='CLSID:22d6f312-b0f6-11d0-94ab-0080c74c7e95'
codebase='http://activex.microsoft.com/activex/controls/mplayer/en/nsmp2inf.cab#Version=5,1,52,701'
standby='Loading Microsoft Windows Media Player components...' type='application/x-oleobject'>
<param name='fileName' value="URL of your Windows Media Video file goes here">
<param name='animationatStart' value='true'>
<param name='transparentatStart' value='true'>
<param name='autoStart' value="true">
<param name='showControls' value="true">
<param name='loop' value="false">
<EMBED type='application/x-mplayer2'
pluginspage='http://microsoft.com/windows/mediaplayer/en/download/'
id='mediaPlayer' name='mediaPlayer' displaysize='4' autosize='-1'
bgcolor='darkblue' showcontrols="true" showtracker='-1'
showdisplay='0' showstatusbar='-1' videoborder3d='-1' width="320" height="240"
src="URL of your Windows Media Video goes here" autostart="true" designtimesp='5311' loop="false">
</EMBED></OBJECT></center>
Replace URL of your Windows Media Video goes here with that of your WMV file and insert the height and width values for your file.
Invitations to view
After checking that your online virtual card looks the business, you’ll need to let people know it is there.
If you have used a video sharing site, it will be more personal - and less likely to get snagged in content filters – to send out the invite from your own domain. All you need do is explain the purpose of your email and include the link to the card in the body of the email. Type out the full web address of the card in case the link doesn’t open directly from the email. It’s an idea to say something along the lines of, “If the card doesn’t open by clicking on this link, copy and paste it into the address bar of your web browser.”
Sending out lots of email can be a pain, but it will be better than missing out completely by snail mail. If you have a mailing list set up, sending out the invite will be a breeze. If not, it will be a case of ploughing your way through your email address box instead.
A good tip, though, is to send out the email invites in alphabetic batches. That way it will be easier to identify any dodgy address that stops the email from being sent, and also to keep track of bounce backs that may need to be resent.
